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Flames delight dads with wild 9-6 win in Columbus

Johnny Gaudreau.Photo: Jim McIsaac

Wes Gilbertson

Published: December 5, 2018 - 9:45 AM

COLUMBUS — The dads must have been distressed.

Then dazzled.

Delighted.

And by the final buzzer, perhaps a bit dazed.

From to hard-to-watch to hard-to-believe, the Calgary Flames erased a three-goal deficit Tuesday and stormed to a 9-6 victory over the Columbus Blue Jackets at Nationwide Arena — a wacky, wild capper to their Dad’s Trip.

“It was probably pretty rowdy for the forwards’ and maybe a couple of the defencemen’s dads,” quipped Flames masked man Mike Smith, who watched an ugly first period from the bench before earning the win in relief of David Rittich. “And I’m sure that Keith Tkachuk has seen a couple of those games back when he played. For my dad, he comes in shaking his head a little bit, like, ‘Phew, I’m glad that’s over.’ And I am, too.

“But I think it’s been a fun trip for the dads. The dads went 3-0, including the game at home, so I think everyone is pretty excited about how it turned out.”

The Fathers-of-the-Flames watched Tuesday’s thriller from a private suite, and it must have been a subdued bunch when the Blue Jackets opened up a 3-1 lead after 20 minutes.

Although one of the proud papas predicted a comeback during the first intermission, that seemed like quite a long-shot when Smith received a rude welcome, with the hosts notching their fourth of the night at the 0:49 mark of the middle stanza.

Flames celebrate a goal in the second period against the Columbus Blue Jackets on Tuesday, Dec. 4, 2018, at Nationwide Arena in Columbus, Ohio.

“Sean Monahan’s dad, he said, ‘We’ve got them right where we want them,’ ” revealed Paul Giordano, father of Calgary’s captain. “And it worked out for us. He called it.”

John Monahan’s sharpshooting son played a key role in making sure of it.

Monahan and close pal Johnny Gaudreau both piled up four points — two tallies apiece, plus a pair of assists — in Tuesday’s throwback, while Matthew Tkachuk scored once and set up two others.

TJ Brodie, Austin Czarnik, Noah Hanifin and Elias Lindholm also tickled twine for the Flames, while Cam Atkinson led the local charge with a hat-trick.

Here’s how coach Bill Peters saw the game:

“We were bad in the first — there’s no sugar-coating it,” said Flames’ heart-and-soul Mark Giordano, who contributed three assists. “I didn’t think we were moving very well. They looked like the better team. But it seemed like after their fourth goal, we decided to start playing and turn the switch.

“A weird one, but it’s good to be on the right side of that one.”

Good for the boys.

Good for the dads, too, with a grand total of 27 special guests on this two-game getaway to Chicago and Columbus.

“There were probably a lot of momentum changes in the booth, just like there was in the game,” Giordano grinned, envisioning the scene in the fathers’ suite. “It was great to have them, and they weren’t bored, by any means.”

Added Hanifin: “I can only imagine, when we were coming back, they must have been fired up.”

Shortly after Atkinson sniped his second of the night to give the Blue Jackets a 4-1 cushion, Monahan deflected Giordano’s wrister from the point for a power-play strike.

The out-of-towners were just — or finally — getting warmed up.

Lindholm roofed a wicked shot less than a minute later.

Again on the man-advantage, Tkachuk cleaned up the leftovers after one leaked through Sergei Bobrovsky in the home crease.

Fifty seconds later, Hanifin pounced on a between-the-legs pass from Tkachuk to give the Flames an unlikely lead.

Before anybody had scraped their jaws off the floor, Brodie cashed in a rebound.

Blue Jackets captain Nick Foligno cut into the damage on a breakaway, but Monahan (again) and Gaudreau (again) scored early in the third to keep the dads hooting and hollering.

Not that the nailbiting was quite done, either.

Here’s how Blue Jackets coach John Tortorella saw the game:

“At 8-6, I still think we have a really good chance,” said Blue Jackets coach John Tortorella, referring to Atkinson’s hat-trick goal. “They score that ninth one, and that took the wind out of our sails. Yeah, imagine me saying that, huh?”

Nothing about this night was easy to imagine.

Except, apparently, for John Monahan.

“We just don’t feel like we’re ever out of a game,” said Flames head coach Bill Peters. “We knew that we could play better. We weren’t impressed with ourselves through 20, through 30, through 40 …

“And we just kept getting better after each period.”

FAMILY MATTERS

Guy Gaudreau’s heart stopped while he was running a half marathon in March.

He survived to tell the story.

His superstar son — Flames forward whiz Johnny Gaudreau — has always talked about the importance of family but admitted that scare changed his perspective some.

“Anytime I saw my family, I didn’t realize how special it is until after that happened,” Johnny said. “Whether it’s my brother, my sisters, my nieces, my mom, my dad … Any time that you get to spend some time with them, especially during the season because you don’t get to see them much, you have to make the most of it.

“I always enjoyed spending time with them, but I don’t think I realized it as much until that little incident happened,” he added. “After that happened, I had a really good summer with him and he’s doing really well now. So it’s great to have him here. It wouldn’t have been the same without him here.”

Guy Gaudreau joked that he’ll need to go on a diet after the Dad’s Trip — the long-running line is that NHL stands for ‘Never Hungry League’ — but he is, indeed, doing well.

“Once they got me started up again, everything was fine,” Guy said. “They put a couple of stents up there, and the guy who put the stents in, he’s a marathon runner and he said, ‘You can go back to running. No heart damage, nothing. You’re healthy as ever.’ ”

Johnny hustled back home to Carneys Point, N.J., when Guy was hospitalized near the end of last season, but he only missed two games with his father bugging him to get back to work despite the Flames already being bounced from playoff contention.

He also encouraged his boy to accept an invite to represent Team USA at worlds.

After all, he wanted to watch some hockey.

Guy should have enjoyed the show on his third Dad’s Trip — Johnny collected two helpers in Chicago and then scored twice and added a pair of assists during Tuesday’s wild one in Columbus. The Flames won on both stops.

“We watch the boys on TV, but now you get to go from place to place with them and you kind of get to appreciate the wear and tear on the body,” Guy said. “I mean, these kids are on the go all the time — one rink to the other, practice, meetings, eating. It’s not like, ‘Just go out and do whatever you want to do.’ So you get to appreciate that time and effort they put in to become a good team.

“And it’s great to spend some time with him, right? Because it’s not like we live within an hour flight and we’re there (in Calgary). It’s a long ways from the East Coast. And when he comes to the East Coast, we really get just to see the game and say hi to him afterward and they’re on a bus and away they go. So it’s fun to be here with him.

“I’m really proud of him.”

AROUND THE BOARDS

Flames forwards Sam Bennett and Derek Ryan didn’t log a single shift in Tuesday’s third period as the bench was shortened. Crash-and-bang winger Garnet Hathaway only hit the ice once in the final frame … The Flames dusted off Dalton Prout in Columbus, ending his 59-day wait to see his name on an NHL lineup sheet again. The 28-year-old rearguard was healthy for that entire stretch. Save for a week-long conditioning stint with the AHL’s Stockton Heat, he has been quietly, patiently and positively going about his business as the seventh or even eighth defenceman on Calgary’s roster. “Every day, it is what you make it,” Prout reasoned prior to Tuesday’s battle with the Blue Jackets, his original big-league employer. “You have to understand that your work ethic, your work habits, your attitude whether in or out of the lineup, can effect. It can bring the group up or bring the group down. It’s part of growing up. It’s part of being a professional. It’s part of understanding where you sit on the totem pole and what your role is” … How about this tidbit from Sportsnet Stats? On four different occasions already this season, the Flames have exploded for five goals in one period. Thirty other NHL teams have combined to achieve that feat a grand total of three times. Combined. Wow …

OFF THE GLASS

When the Flames visited Columbus last season, the Blue Jackets gutted out a 1-0 overtime triumph. Tuesday’s stat-sheet looked a whole lot different … Bill Peters spent seven winters on the bench staff for the Western Hockey League’s Spokane Chiefs, including plenty of visits to Seattle to square off with the Thunderbirds. So what does the Flames’ head coach think of the NHL’s expansion to the Emerald City? “Home run,” Peters replied. “Great sports town. You look at the Mariners, you look at the Seahawks, you look at the history they had in the WPHL, the old Western Pro Hockey League … It’s going to be an absolute home run” … Flames winger Michael Frolik had a setback in his recovery from a lower-body injury. He hasn’t even skated in the past week.